Update from Swan 45 Rancho Deluxe Transpac 200707/14/2007, 27 47.590n:122 11.747
Good morning!
If you are following our position reports you will notice two things; 1. We are the most Southerly boat in our class and 2. our current class standing is 7th.
The other boats are headed straight to Hawaii and we have driven well South. They are closer to Hawaii than we are, however our strategy is to skirt the Southern edge of the Pacific high in order to have more wind AND be able to sail a faster angle to Diamond Head. We will sail a longer distance, but hopefully way faster!
The weather routing information we have recieved pre-departure and continue to get via satelite makes us optimistic that this will work, but it's been ugly so far. By Sunday morning we will start to see if our strategy will pay dividends.
Last night the sky clouded-over. Without a moon or stars, there was no horizon making driving the boat more like a video game...you watched the instruments and worked hard to not get vertigo while your watch mates ate chocolate bars and the single guys told provacative stories about recent conquests. No-one paid more attention than young John who certainly got an earfull of modern dating wisdom.
Currently we have the A2 spinnaker and staysail flying. Combined with the super-sized mainsail on Rancho Deluxe we are flying more square feet of sail area than a super Wall Mart.
In the meantime, the crew is great, the boat is perfect and we are well fed!
Jim Diepenbrock
http://www.sailblogs.com/member/ranchodeluxe/?xjMsgID=33333
Photo by Jim Diepenbrock
